Hey DB community! I am around and reading here and there, but not as active. Things are still the same on my end, hence no real updates. Moving in a couple of weeks to my apartment and I am looking forward to it. Yesterday I felt sad about it as it felt like I was losing something again. I processed my emotions, shed a few tears, and then took a nap. Woke up feeling better and started working on future plans. Re-framed my thoughts and realized that it's natural to feel the way I felt, and I am glad that I don't suppress my emotions anymore. Healthy release and then back on the saddle. Overall I am doing great and my emotional intelligence has improved tremendously.
Slight deviation - I had found an amazing piece on CL that I am sharing below. Can't post links so going to share the text. One of the things that made me crazy was W telling me that 'she has been unhappy for years'. I didn't know how to deal with that and how to even counter it, until I found this on CL that talks exactly about that. It's an old post. This is for the newbies who are getting the same line as one of the reasons for BD. Hopefully this will help.
-------------------------------
The other week someone asked me to decode, “I haven’t been happy for a long time.” (Also sometimes expressed as “WE haven’t been happy for a long time.”)
It’s trotted out when the chump is looking for an explanation as to why their family life just blew up.
Well DUH. “I haven’t been happy for a long time!”
This statement presupposes a number of things:
A) That the cheater’s happiness is the most important thing (and is a valid answer to the Why Did You Commit This Dreadful Betrayal?)
B) That they’ve silently suffered for a long time and gee whiz, isn’t it time AT LAST! that they experience some true happiness?
And…
C) How could you be so dumb that you never noticed how unhappy they were? Heck, how could you not notice how unhappy YOU were until they pointed it out? (WE haven’t been happy for a long time.)
This sends the chump into apoplexies of self reflection. Well, yes, I am sometimes unhappy, but it passes. Or… hang on, how could I have missed my spouse’s cosmic misery? Apparently it was long and went on for EONS. Am I just that insensitive?
Of course you have no way of challenging this “I haven’t been happy for a long time” statement because you are not in their heads. You have no idea what they feel. So if you say, “BUT YOU LOOKED HAPPY. You had kids with me! We went snorkeling in Barbados! You drank the coffee I brought to you every morning! You said you LOVED your birthday slippers!” the cheater can just say, “Nope. I wasn’t happy.”
But you looked happy. Happy enough anyway.
“No, I was full of sorrow. Every minute. My life was a burden of grief and misery. At night I used to gnaw at the invisible chains that kept me tethered to you.”
Oh.
So chumps, how are you supposed to interpret this “I haven’t been happy for a long time” crap? Here’s a few ways to look at it:
1.) Take them at their word. Okay, you’ve been a miserable sod for decades. You, cheater, are responsible for addressing the things that make you unhappy and adjusting your life accordingly. While as a loving spouse I want to support you, if your needs are not communicated to me, there is jack $hit I can do to help you.
2) Don’t accept responsibility. If the cheater was so unhappy in the marriage, they had ethical ways to go about ending their marriage — beginning with trying to save it first. Or getting out honestly before they told all their “troubles” to a sympathetic f#$kbuddy.
3) They’re bull$hitting you. Cake is delicious. They were probably perfectly happy with you and the services you provided — paycheck, child-rearing, air of respectability. It wasn’t until they were busted at D-Day that their Great Unhappiness was revealed. Blame shifting their “unhappiness” on to you is an invitation to do the pick me dance. Oh, you’re unhappy? How can I make you happy? I can control that! I can WIN your happiness! Let me TRY HARDER!
And guess what, they’re probably pulling the same $hit on the affair partner. Oh, my marriage makes me so unhappy, but I must stay for the children! I am a noble slave to convention! Woe! And the affair partner goes, I will PROVE to you that I can make you happy! I can control your destiny! I can WIN!
Cake, cake, wonderful cake.
A lot of truth in there. In the end, the WW/WH is simply justifying their own crappy behavior to make themselves feel better or get validation from their enabling crew of friends, fellows cheaters, and family.
If the LBS was so bad that they WH/WW was truly never happy, then OMG everyone is overcome with joy for the newfound happiness. We can't stop someone from being happy can we? Puke.
It always takes two to tango. The LBS isn't innocent, and the LBS's stupid crap that they pulled doesn't justify the stupid crap that the WS pulls. But we are emotional, crazy creatures and this is the manifestation of being pulled in so many directions at once. That's why it is on the LBS to become the rock, the lighthouse, and light a path out of the storm and into a safe harbor.
Thanks for sharing that.
H 34 W 29 BD 3/12/18 Divorce Busted Spring 19
It is not things that bother us, but the stories we tell ourselves about things.
